Discuss the view that the influence of religion on UK society is declining

The UK is lucky to build much(prenominal) a vibrant, diverse and accomplished population from migrants that provoke entered our sm altogether islands from the past few thousand years. provided each term they make Britain thither home, they bring there sacred belief. This gives climb on to the military manly concerny worships and there denominations that energize a presence. further what is a organized trust? correspond to the Penguin vocabulary of Sociology it is A set of cultural caprices, symbols, and executes that focus on the meaning of lifespan and the nature of the unknown. Secularisation had been happening for long time before Nietzsche proclaimed, matinee idol is Dead and is a far to a greater extent intricate process than just a drop in church building service citeing. Marxists recollect that religion is form of social control on the proletariat by the bourgeoisie. He saw religion as the opium of the masses, program line them acceptance which was strengthened by hymns like All things bright and beautiful which had verses akin to The rich man in his castle, the poor man at his gate, beau ideal made them, high-pitched or lowly, and ordered their e press out. aided there exploitation by teaching them to accept there place in society because it was God wished.When Marx wrote this, churches had a high monopoly on truth so people would be more inclined to believe it. Looking at statistics of ex and current commie countries it is clear that secularization is very high with the majority of Britain from Chinese beget out claiming they obtain no religion, it is likewise known that countries that follow a Marxist, still stringently, doctrine that government officials moldiness have no religion, this is very widely enforced within the Peoples Re prevalent of Chinas administration unless not as obligatory within the soviets of the USSR.With lonesome(prenominal) hotshot class there should be no reason for a religion to cont rol society, however when countries became communist the did not all suddenly drop there views and become atheists, heretofore if these values were taught at school, they were still taught in the home as firstborn socialisation always comes before flakeary much(prenominal)(prenominal) as the school. The media openly ridicules religion by broadcasting comedies such as Father Ted and The Vicar of Dibley which pose very un orthodox Ministers and there they very un orthodox parishioners.But the media does not stop there it regularly comments on the flaws in religion by dint of various mediums such as articles printed about the bonuses of secularisation and TV programs craft for religions to be abolished in the bid for world peace. However many a(prenominal) of the Abrahamic religions forgot the second commandment Though shall not worship false idols and would God really smite the celebrities that use there fame to help highlight likable run for and those less fortunate than ourselves?However jealous a immortal he is, does he approve of celebrities such as The Pope or Grand Ayatollah? Even with there religious leadership they still fit the job description of a celebrity. Religions are often accused of existence behind the times on items seen as very taboo up to now have always been there, especially gay rights and spontaneous abortion. some religions see all human life as sacred and that abortion is an act of cleanup one of gods children so a sin, they also conform to functionalist view of homogonous, heterosexual, monogynous marriage been the only appropriate view on raising children. at bottom the past hundred years many laws have been passed that work towards an classless society in which no person is superior or inferior to an new(prenominal) such as gay rights, abortion rights and gender equality, which have been advocated for as long as Plato in his The Republic in which he sees men and fair sex indifferent albeit for childbirth and str ength, to which he argues that some woman are dependableer than some men.Moreover, some religious organisations have moved passably with times, notably the Anglican faith which no allows gay and fe manful Vicars, abortion in trusted circumstances as well as disjoin and remarriage. So as many equality principles have been oppressed by religion and are only recently winning it over, only one has been supported which is race equality, which was lead and fronted by one the most famed men in the world, a Methodist minister, Dr Martin Luther King.But to counter that the Dutch Reform perform openly supported Apartheid in South Africa, as well as many Far Right Political Groups in general National Socialism Groups such as Hitlers Administration nevertheless also the BNP and NF groups which solely believe in Aryan Protestants to be the superior race, a dumbfounded patriarchal view that contradicts many statements within the bible including when saviour rescuer died on the Cross for our sins he removed all barriers including that of gender, race, and nationality.This is as said by the apostle Paul There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ then you are heirs according to the bid (Galatians 328-29). Weber first introduced his theory of rationalization in his book The Protestant Ethic and the step of Capitalism, He predicts a decline in religion due to industrial emanation, plurality of religions and a rise in science and technology to help questions that gave rational answers juxtaposed to religions double statement of it was Gods will.He looks at the Protestant denomination of Calvinism who believed in predestination and worked hard to beat their anxiety on whether they would be accepted into heaven. Eventually this evolved from a monopoly on truth to a monopoly of industry with many Calvinites becoming successful capitalistic businesspeople, for which Weber argued was inev itable. A rise in religious pluralism also adds to secularisation as single(a) religions are loosing their monopoly on truth as they are co-habiting and recognising new(prenominal) religions.Many large religious buildings now have faith rooms in which all religions are welcome. Also some Christian denominations meet and work together as Christians this is called Ecumenicalism. Within the past 250 years scientific advancement has gone from virtually nothing to a vital part our lifes today, religion has caught along on this bandwagon as well, and to only a certain extent. Darwins theory of evolution is still questioned by some many religious individuals however these are mainly creationists.Weber suggested that eventually the mystical ideas would be succumbed by scientific ones. Durkheim (1965) suggests that religion was about celebrating the rules of your society and making the citizens keep back to those rules. Yet, he argues, that as a society becomes more complex religion stru ggles to bind individuals due to industrialization and social fragmentation that regulate religion into a corner of where it becomes one of many beliefs and fails to unify members of society.Secularists and Antidisestablishmentarians have fought along side the broad left and broad right respectively, but but any battles have been as severe as the Spanish obliging war (1936 1939) The Republicans were secularists and some of the more radical groups within in them such as the Stalinists NKVD committed terrible atrocities against the catholic church in Spain such as massacring clergy and destroying churches and monasteries. While the Nationalists were led by the infamous General Francisco Franco and had for the most part fascist yet catholic views and ties.They suppressed the terrorist secularist activities by executing teachers that promoted the remotion of the church from education. Clear Statistics prove a decline in church attendance (All Protestant and Roman Catholic) from 30% of the population in 1900 to 12% in 1990, Hamilton (? ) Table 1. However a Social Attitudes Survey (1992) cited in Haralambous et al (2000) table 7. 19 pg 479 states that 75% of people believe in at some point God with or without scepticism, while the rest 25% either stated they were Atheists, no answer or that they did not if there was a God and believed there was no way to find out.As 75% of people still believe in God at some point, this adds to the point that people may not be attending churches but still are retaining faith and does indicate a rise in Atheism. Davie calls this believe without belonging. Returning back to the Penguins Dictionary of Sociologys definition of religion in no point of the description does it state that one has to attend a specific place of worship to practice there religion.This adds to the point that people have not stopped believing in god but that openly practicing in public, this could be that a conventional church does not fit in with there v iews of a religion or their lifestyles. In America Evangelical Christians have used the TV to their advantage and started to broadcast live sermons, this is taking the idea of songs of praise to a new level and with channels emerging such as GOD channel, religious sermons can make it into our homes if we choose.Furthermore, Christian Church attendance was only mentioned above so what would be held for other religions and the attendance at there place of worship. Other data suggests that Christianity is just for Christmas According to UK Census Data (2001) 71. 6% claim to be Christian, 2. 7% to be Muslim, 1. 0% to be Hindu, 0. 6% to be Sikh, 0. 5% to be Jewish, 0. 3% to Buddhist and 23. 2% either have no religion or did not state one. However, comparing this with data from Social Trends 30 (2000) cited in Moore (2001) pg 417 suggest that while Christianity may be on the decrease other religions are not.Islam in the UK had change magnitude 380% from 130,000 individuals in 1970 to 49 5,000 individuals. As well the get along of people stating their religion as Sikhism increased 250% from 1970 to 1990. Interestingly, participants of other non-Christian religious institutions had increased 231% over the twenty-year period, these could be institutions that conform to the description of a religion but are either world rejecting or world affirming. realism rejecting religions promise savoir on judgement day and normally have very tight, relentless rules and regulations placed upon their members, and most of all see the world as a bad place in which will not make it into heaven. World affirming religions on the other hand are withal promised savour but do not have as many tight restrictions on its members but maybe one or two, such as no sex before marriage or no drinking alcohol and most primary(prenominal)ly do not see the world as a bad place. There are many ruleical issues brocaded when querying any religion topic, let alone secularisation.There are many poi nts to include when research is undertaken for instance the reliability of the data, would a different research get the same results or if a different sample of participants and method of data collection was used. Is their a true representative sample, this would be important as Britain is a highly religiously diverse country and a poor sample could obscure the results. How valid is the data actually gained is it what the police detective aimed to find in their question or is it irrelevant due to an ambiguous question.Religion is a very private matter and a investigator must question there self on how far they may be intruding on a participants life or institution. last a researcher must be sensitive to the data and interaction with participants, as beliefs are very sacred to a person they must be fully aware of their customs so that they do not offend. Secondary sources must be looked at with great care and what they declare applied today for example a woman practicing herbal euphony would not be seen as anything bizarre in todays world but 400 years ago burnt at the stake for witchcraft.In conclusion the debate of secularisation has rage on with the sociological world for many year, yet a unified decision has yet too be and probably wont be made. Bellah (1967) and Luckman (1996) both argue that religion is not in decline but is merely changing form. They say that the public side of religion may be in decline but the private side of religion and personal belief is not. Berger (1967) on the other hand says that religion is loosing its traditional place within society motto how the growth of science and technology has questioned it, and suggests that religion, as a way of life is no longer in capacity to do so.Wilson (1966) described secularisation as the process whereby religious thinking, practices and institutions lose their social significance But even though there is a drop in church attendance, society is not loosing its belief in a religion. Many religions have religious buildings to worship their god, yet with some religions it is not compulsory to attend them regularly, such as Islam and Judaism perhaps Christianity has to learn from its religious relatives.On the adverse Voas (2005) gives evidence for a significant rise in church attendance around Christmas time, which can rise by 330% in some bishopric in Anglican Britain. Perhaps this suggests that Anglicans choose to go to church only at special religious occasions. Many sociologists looking at secularisation focus on Britain and do to take into account other countries that have taken a huge rise of fundamentalism such as the ground forces and Iran, which are closely linked too politics.Fundamentalists, such as the Christian Coalition, helped shape the policies of the Reagan and Bush administrations, Bruce (1995). Finally Stark and Bainbridge (1990) suggest that secularisation and strong religious belief alternate in a cyclical pattern. From this I agree with Bella h and Luckman that religion is not in decline but merely changing the form in which it presents its self within society, as there is more corroboration between researchers that suggest people have not lost faith.